Mia and Harrison Graydon have moved to a small town near Philadelphia to re-set their life. He’s a busy doctor who hopes that working for a smaller hospital will mean more family time and Mia is anxious to focus on her art and thinks this fresh start will help.

Their new start though is upset by Mia not being able to find any art galleries that will represent her and most devastating of all is the third miscarriage she’ll face. Harrison for his part is very supportive of Mia but he doesn’t know how much more he is willing to see his wife in pain over not being able to have a child. He sinks deeper into work and Mia starts to feel disconnected and alone with the exception of the dreams she has.

Mia has always dreamt about a stranger and one day in town she sees the man of her dreams in the flesh at a local store no less. Later Mia will once again run into him and as the two become acquainted Oliver shares that he’s also been having dreams about Mia for a long time.

What is this strange connection they have and surely there must be some explanation. Does Mia tell her husband and what is he going to make of her wanting to explore this?

I liked how the author addressed the issue of infertility and the toll it takes on the couple. My favorite part of the book though was the exploration of dreams and could two people really share a dream. For those of you who enjoy will they or won’t they stories, you might like this as you don’t know what will happen with the characters but some may find this problematic because Mia is after all married. I thought the story read very quickly and was engrossing enough to get me out of a reading slump I had been going through last month.

I wrote the Bookreporter review for this one. It was fine but not what I was expecting. I was hoping for a better story, and I really disliked the ending.

Mia Graydon’s life seems perfect; she has the house, her loving husband, and dreams of starting a family. But she has other dreams too — unexplained, recurring ones starring the same man. Still, she doesn’t think much of them, until a relocation to small-town Pennsylvania brings her face to face with the stranger she has been dreaming about for years. And this man harbors a jaw-dropping secret of his own—he’s been dreaming of her too. Determined to understand, Mia and this not-so-stranger search for answers. But when diving into their pasts begins to unravel her life in the present, Mia emerges with a single question—what if? review: You Were There Too touches on the many complicated aspects of life, love and fate. Truthfully, I wanted to like this book more than I did. I didn’t feel a real emotional pull to any of the characters and with the story being mainly about love and relationships the lack of romantic emotion between the characters really bothered me. I kept hoping to feel something, anything but never really did until towards the end. The first half the book was very lackluster, which surprised me because the premise was so unique! I do need to mention that this book does have triggers including multiple miscarriages and death. rating: 3 out of 5 ⭐️

I have so many feels about this book. I have been so anxious to read this book since I first heard about it. It's a mix of mystery and romance which is my two favorite things combined. The twists, the relationships, the thrill!! I can't take my mind off this book. These characters are really likable and you become so invested into them. Loved this!

**Thank you to Berkley for the free copy!**

“Maybe instead of wondering why we’re all connected, what’s important - the only thing that’s important - is to know that we are.” ⁣

YOU WERE THERE TOO is the first novel I’ve read by author Colleen Oakley, but it will not be my last. In fact, I’m definitely going to check out some of her backlist titles. ⁣
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If you’re a fan of Taylor Jenkins Reid, this novel reminds me a bit of MAYBE IN ANOTHER LIFE (one of my faves), and I think you’d enjoy this one, as well! ⁣
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It seems like for months I had You Were There Too on my TBR. The description seemed like an interesting concept that I hadn’t read before. I like the idea of being connected to someone but not knowing why. But for some strange reason I kept putting it off. Until I finally just read it and man was it a rollercoaster of emotions. When I was 50% done I was uncertain if I was going to enjoy the rest of the book. I really liked Mia and Harrison but I didn’t 100% love how Mia was behaving. I understood it to an extent but it still wasn’t sitting right. And then I hit about 70% and I was hooked. The last part of the book was so emotionally draining and I loved every minute of it. These characters I had gotten to know and enjoy all clicked into the places they were supposed to be and it was book reading magic. Would I recommend You Were There Too? Yup. But I would do so with a warning that it is not a romance. It is a love story of sort but definitely not a romance. Be prepared and have the tissues handy. This one will hurt.

What an incredibly emotional and powerful book! Colleen Oakley really made these characters sympathetic and memorable. Fertility struggles embody such strong, powerful emotions, and those emotions are unforgettable. I really felt for Mia and Harrison. This book is easy to read in one sitting because of how gripping and real it is. It is the kind of book that leaves you thinking about it for a long time after. This would be an excellent read for a book club!

Thank you to NetGalley for the digital ARC and the chance to review this book!

Unfortunately, this was not the book for me. I tried very hard to read it, but I had to DNF it.

I don't feel like I can accurately review this book as I did not finish it. So I kept this as neutral as I could. And rated it 3 stars.

Thank you for allowing me the chance to read it.

Such a well,thought,out,story of chance, fate, love and choices. This is one of those rare novels that is well done and so thought provoking that it stays with you after you’re done.

Wow this was an intense read that gave me all the feelings, with a shocker of an ending that had me in tears. This was a quick read, that I absolutely devoured because I just needed to know what everything meant, much like the main character. This book definitely made me think of the choices I make and how life could be completely different if I had made a different decision. It even made me revisit some dreams I recently had that I thought were odd, trying to figure out what exactly they were trying to tell me.

All her life Mia dreamed of being a mother, of having a child of her own, having just suffered her third miscarriage and finding out that her husband, Harrison, genetically are uncompatible to conceive might mean her dream never comes true. That's not all she's dreamed about, she's dreamed about a man she's never met, at various places and she feels such a strong connection to him. Until one day she sees him in real life, but how is this possible and what does it all mean. As if this couldn't possibly get anymore weird, Mia finds out Oliver also dreamed of her, nightmares to be excate where most of the time Mia dies. As Mia tries to come to terms with what meeting Oliver means, and her husband proclaiming he no longer wants a baby. She comes to a crossroads stay with her husband or experience life with Oliver. Mia makes her decision and sticks by it, and then right infront of her eyes the scene from her dream appears, the day that will forever change her life.

Wow is all I can say! This book is perfect for those who enjoyed Jill Santopolo and Josie Silver. I found myself quickly reading this one to see how their dreams would eventually come together and the ending just stays with you.

If you love romance novels and books that Oprah recommends you will love this. I also would recommend if to watchers of Hallmark Christmas movies and the Lifetime movie channel.

“You Were There Too” by Colleen Oakley: Oakley’s previous novel “Close enough to Touch,” dealt with the question of choice vs. fate. In her new book, “You Were There Too,” Mia Graydon’s life seems like absolute perfection: a house, a loving husband and the dream of starting a family. But Mia frequently dreams of another man who is not her husband, a man who she’s never met. She dismisses the dreams as a fluke, until by chance, she encounters the very man she’s been dreaming about. And this man has been dreaming of her too.
Oakley enchants with this story of love and fate, weighing whether anything is really "meant to be."

I still plan on reading a final copy of YOU WERE THERE TOO, but unfortunately I was unable to review the eARC before it was archived.

If you've ever pondered with the question of "what if", then this book is for you. Haven't we all? Through this mesmerizing tale of extremely well-developed characters and a surprising, keeps you on your toes, cannot put the book down for FOMO, Oakley is sure to knock it out of the park in this beautiful novel for you. This unforgettable love story follows Mia Graydon as we navigate her life of balancing what is real and what only occurs in dreams. Could the two possibly collide? Will she or won't she cheat? These are questions that you will find yourself pondering over in various scenarios and capacities as you plow through this story. Per the book summary, considering your best life is one led by your heart, this heart wrenching story takes us into a life that looks perfect down to details from the outside. However, the reoccurring dreams that appear almost magical to Mia question an alternate life lived with a stranger. This was the first book I have read from Oakley and I have already added her to my favorites list. This is sure to be a bang-up hit in the coming year and if you miss it, you will certainly regret having done so!

Full of potential but the execution did not work for me. The salvation of this book was the unexpected and riveting ending. I wish the remaining 90% had gripped me in the same way.

2.5 stars

For all the resistance I gave You Were There Too in the beginning, it ended up being an incredible read for me. When the book finally picked up, I avoided every responsibility possible just so I could finish.

To be fair, my own unusual attitude toward reading (maybe a book hangover, though I don’t know from what) over the past few months aside, You Were There Too did seem to start off a little slow. I couldn’t get into Mia’s mind or perspective as much as I wanted.

And then Oakley hit me with the miscarriages part of Mia’s story. I had just recently (and I really mean recently, like just a day or two prior) found out I was pregnant. Reading Mia’s struggles to create the family she desperately wanted helped flesh out her character more in my mind.

As I continued with the story, I grew more invested in each of the characters, especially Oliver. He seemed like someone I would like to know in real life, a true gem of a person with interesting stories and experiences and a fresh outlook on life.

The very best part of this book, though, for me has been the quality of conversations I’ve had with others based on a conversation between Mia and Harrison about soulmates. I don’t want to say too much on this as it might affect your outlook on one or either of the characters, but I firmly agree with one of them. I’ve since asked others their opinions on soulmates and feel so much closer to them because of the depths and concepts we explored through dialogue. That truly wouldn’t have happened without You Were There Too planting that seed in my brain.

I knew weeks ago, just as I was starting to get back into reading this, that my heart would break for everyone in this novel. With the ending Colleen Oakley gave us, I was 100% correct. This book wasn’t at all what I thought it would be, but I’m deeply appreciative of that fact. My first exposure to Colleen Oakley was a huge success, but I’m hoping she doesn’t always end with gut punches!

I absolutely loved this book. It has been a long time since a book made me so emotional it brought me to tears, but You Were There Too did just that. Mia's life seems to be perfect--she has everything she has ever wanted. But she keeps having dreams involving another man she has never met. Then she and her husband move, and she comes face to face with the man from her recurring dreams. They come to realize that he has been dreaming about her, too. As they search to figure out what exactly is happening, Mia's perfect life begins to fall apart, and she's left wondering what if she had chosen differently? You Were There Too sent me on such an emotional roller coaster, you would think I was one of the characters!

This was a unique story that kept me guessing until the very end. At times, I felt like it was taking too long to get to the explanation, but the book was compelling and kept me interested. I liked the three main characters and found myself rooting for all of them equally. Looking forward to reading more from this author.

Do you believe that your dreams have meaning? What would you do if you dreamt about someone you don’t know, and then met that person in real life?

In Colleen Oakley’s You Were There Too, a woman meets a man literally from her dreams. But the problem is, she is already married. Heart-wrenching and thought-provoking, You Were There Too brings up the questions of fate and how much choice we bear in the way our lives unfold.

This book is not entirely what I expected—in a good way! With these sorts of stories, I always expect the current relationship to be unhappy, leaving a gap for the new (or in this case, dream) relationship to grab footing and traction. However, life isn’t that simple, and neither is this story. Almost nothing that I expected to happened panned out, and that meant that the book was full of surprises and took a direction I couldn’t have guessed.

Mia’s husband Harrison moved from Philadelphia to a small town a few hours away from the city. Harrison wanted a different pace for work after a tough case at his previous role, and Mia is hoping to heal from the pain of several miscarriages. It’s hard to tell if she and Harrison are even on the same page anymore.

But when Mia sees a man in the grocery store who she has been having dreams about for years, her world is shaken. How can it be? As their lives become intertwined in the small town, and she and Harrison work through their pain over the miscarriages, things get more complicated. What if Mia ended up with the wrong man? What if even a small moment years prior had set her on the wrong course in her life? And is there time to correct it and live the life she may have been meant to live?

A main theme of this book is the notion of fate, and how much we are an agent in choosing our fate. In the case of Mia’s dreams about Oliver, how she chooses to interpret them means a lot. Are they a prediction of the future? Or is she just wanting them to be that and so she is an agent in moving that to fruition? We learn a lot more about both Mia and Oliver’s pasts as well, and I found that to add so much complexity to the story. The small moments they may have intersected without consciously realizing it. And the moments that we can always choose to put weight on or not put weight on—those end up telling us more than assuming everything is random.

The entire ending is so unique and had a lot of really heart-wrenching moments. I was surprised by how emotional this book is! The ending itself is more ambiguous than I thought it would be, and the way everything unfolds is surprising and fitting at the same time. A beautiful story that definitely will make you think!

Thank you to Berkley Publishing for my copy. Opinions are my own.